You can’t complain about your plate being too full if you asked to eat.  I actually heard this from a girl on my team the other day and it stopped me in my tracks.  How often do we say we want things to change or that we want to meet a goal only to complain about it when it shows up or there’s work to be done?  How often are we looking at what we do during the day and asking if it serves the goal?  There’s a difference between filling our time with purposeful and result producing actions and filling our time with busy work.  Busy work will always leave us feeling drained because it’s a time suck.  When we fill our time with result producing activities that drive us forward, we may feel tired but we aren’t drained.  I’ve struggled with something at my 9-5 for a long time and I confronted someone about it the other day.  I walked out of that office feeling utterly spent—exhausted.  It was only 11:00AM and I hadn’t even been there a full three hours and I thought I could lay on the floor and go to sleep.  Later that night I had a meeting with my team.  It was late—it started at 9PM and I had been up since before 4AM—but I ended that call feeling more alive than I had all day.  That’s a good example of how it feels when spirit tells us where we need to go.  It will feel good no matter what else we may be going through.      

The point of the full plate is the universe’s response to what we said we could do and what we want to do.  We receive the things that will help us become the people we want to be.  There may be discomfort as we adjust to what the new requirements are and the things we have to give up, but the plate looks different when we choose different goals.  For example, if we want to be stronger, we will be given things that make us stronger.  People will show up who need our help and expertise when we ask to be of service.  It may not be convenient when it shows up, but the universe wants to see how serious we are about our priorities.  It may happen right in the middle of our day to day job and we may feel overwhelmed, but we have to remember, focus on what brings us closer to our goals.  Remember, if we ask for it, we need to act on it when the opportunity presents itself.  The focus, intention, and the action are what moves us forward.  We can’t talk about the big goals and continue the same patterns.  The universe needs us to get uncomfortable so we grow.    

Above all, we need to remember that the full plate is designed for our benefit, and it really doesn’t feel full if it’s aligned with our purpose and who we are.  This life has prepared us to be who we are meant to be and it will continue to send us the tools we need to fulfill our purpose.  The work we need to be ourselves, to be the best version of ourselves shows up exactly when we need it.  We need to be grateful when it shows up.  Take it as a sign of our alignment, don’t be afraid of it.  The beautiful part in all of this is that when our plate becomes too full, we have the ability to feed others.  That’s the magic of the universe—we are always provided for in the way we need most and then we are able to help provide for others.  Aligned work doesn’t really feel like work and it serves many.  It energizes us and it keeps us in constant flow where time is irrelevant.  We can stop carrying multiple plates and we can focus on the one that fills us up the most so that way the unnecessary work falls away and the goal becomes clear.  Be purposeful and intentional and we can’t go wrong.  Always be grateful for what we have, release what we no longer need, and find ways to share our plate. It all falls into place.